I'm not sure if this is the proper section for this, so feel free to move it if there's somewhere else that is better.

An acquaintance of mine is in nursing school, and in his nutrition class he has to create a diet profile for five people. He mentioned to me he would be really excited to profile a vegan diet. I am active, and have put effort before into both cutting down, and bulking up, but have never logged my diet, and I thought it would be beneficial to get a baseline of my diet (plus he could help to tell me if I'm disproportionate in what I am eating).

I blogged 10 days of normal eating and drinking, and made a concerted effort not to modify my behavior just because I knew I was being watched. You'll notice around day 6 or 7, some vegan cookies make it into the blog

About me:

27 years old, 6'2" (190cm), 174lbs (79kg). I've been vegetarian since I was 18. From 19 to 21 I was vegan, and then after developing an allergy to tofu I lapsed back into eating some dairy (read: cheese), and eventually eggs. In late 2007 I became tired of the tofu issues, as well as a long term relationship with someone who is not vegan, keeping me from living how I feel is best. I'm vegan again now (for the last several months), and feeling very positive again about my diet.

My main athletic interest is rock climbing (bouldering).. I try to climb 4-5x per week. In addition to climbing, I run about 30 miles per week. I started running around June of '07 as a way to cut down, and get in better cardio shape (bouldering tends to be anaerobic). Before I started running, for the first half of 2007 I was lifting almost every day, but eventually stopped entirely (and started running to cut down) after putting on way too much muscle in the wrong places (for climbing) as well as fat. I ballooned up to 210 from 185 by eating 300+grams of protein per day (which, in retrospect, was way too much, although I did enjoy eating as many protein shakes/bars as I desired haha!). So from June of last year, to now I've cut down from 210 to 174. I've probably lost at least 1/2 (if not more) of the muscle I added from lifting, since most of it was in non-climbing muscle groups.

Nowadays I concentrate on just climbing as much as I feel my body can handle (and schedule will allow), and trusting in that to put on strength where needed.

About the blog:

If you have any comments or suggestions, feel free to let me know.. I welcome thoughts from anyone. Although the "charts" in the blog were calculated with my weight and activity level slightly off (my friend just guessed), I think the calculations are still mostly right. He also was missing a lot of vitamin info for some of the stuff I eat, and as a result initially reported me as having 0% of my needed Vit A/D/E/K/B12. I sent him photos of some of the food labels, and it's been rectified now.. mostly, at least.. I think it may still be a bit incorrect, but even factoring that it might be a bit off, it seems I would benefit from a multivitamin.

The biggest surprise, to me, was that I'm eating under 2000 calories per day. I'd figured that I was eating about 2500-2600... then again, I'd also figured 300g protein/day was optimal for me to get stronger, so we have established that I am not good with estimation. I was meticulous in my measuring.. I did not estimate anything in the blog if I could avoid it. Whenever possible I would use a measuring cup or a table spoon (etc) to ration the various ingredients.

I imagine some of you will remark that I tend to eat a lot of the same things (cereal, pbj, veggie wraps, soup, rice+seitan).. I have noticed this too, hehe. Working on diversifying my meals (I suck at cooking).

A few photos that might be relevant:

2001, vegan, close to my skinniest (mid 140s). At low 170s now, this shirt is SKIN TIGHT on me.

You eat WAY too much refined wheat flour and too much gluten (fake meat). If eating too much of one food can make you develop an intolerance then you're on your way to doing this with wheat.

You could add some legumes to this diet and nuts. About an ounce per day of nuts. Up to a cup of cooked legumes/beans.

The cookies and jams should be eliminated as they are poor nutritional choices, simple sugars that wreak havoc with your insulin levels.

You definitely need to replace some of the fruit with more leafy greens, broccoli, various colored vegetables. For the calories and sugars, you get more nutritional bang out of a varied diet of greens and colored veggies - you definitely need a multivitamin and an increase in veggies of the sort mentioned.

Where are your omega 3 fatty acids? You are sorely lacking. Add 2 Tbls per day of ground flax or 1 tsp of flax oil to get your required ALA. If you can afford it (and you can easily if you stop eating so much prepared food), get a vegan source of DHA and EPA.

Start making your own lunch and dinner. Too much prepared food is made with unhealthy oils, etc. Don't depend on any business or corporation to feed you for your health. They make food that "tastes good" and has a long shelf life - not usually what's best for your body.

I've developed an allergy to one of the chemicals used in fermentation. Apparently it's fairly common.. I've met a half dozen or so other vegans with the same issue (including two who are founders of Pure Luck, the tasty koreatown-based vegan place towards the end of the blog, where I had the jackfruit burrito.. they have some really good stuff with jackfruit in it, and their use of jackfruit is directly related to their dietary intolerance for tofu).

Thank you for the rest of your commentary, it is very helpful, and I'll add what you suggested into my diet (starting today with flax oil and nuts)-- I suspected I was weak in certain nutritional areas, and hoped this profile would help me to see some of the stuff I'm missing, because it's far too easy for me to look at my diet and think: "way better than the average McDonald's goer.." instead of focus on the vitamins I may be sorely lacking.

I do take some issue with the idea of forgoing forms of sugars (pure fruit preserves, occasional vegan cookies). I don't think the occasional vegan cookie or three is going to cause a major upheaval in my wellbeing or athletic abilities.. but perhaps I do eat too many preserves. Looking at the journal, it does seem fruit-heavy (apples, raspberries, strawberries, various other berries, avocado, etc).

However, tofu does use a coagulant (such as nigari). Maybe that's the problem. My stepdaughter can eat tofu but soy milk makes her throat itch. I'm at a loss. However, it may be an additive in packaged soy milk. But she hasn't had my homemade soy milk so we'll have to wait to test that theory.

Aspherical, I don't think there's anything wrong with some fruit preserves or a cookie either. But when you add in the refined flours, then it's not too good.